Tag: PR

Want to go viral on social media? The Bombay Bicycle Club restaurant in Adelaide shows you how it’s done. But please don’t try this in your own business.

The restaurant created a faux menu showing what prices its menu items would be if they were multiplied 2.75 times. Why, you ask? Because of the penalty rates which the restaurant pays its staff on public holidays.

“We will have to pay our staff 2.75 times the base rate for public holidays. This is how the prices on our bar menu would look using that formula”, the sign read.

All well and good. You can imagine the restaurant’s patrons glancing at the sign as they walked past it. Unfortunately, the restaurant posted an image of the sign on its Facebook page. As you would, right? (Snark.)

The image went viral. Lots of people had opinions, and they posted them on Facebook and Twitter. They also punished the restaurant with one-star reviews.

Then this post appeared on the restaurant’s Facebook page:

The BBC ownership would like to apologize for our sign and Facebook post. We regret the wording. There was no intention to offend anyone.

Overly clever PR? No

When I first heard this story, I thought that a restaurant patron had snapped a photo of the faux menu and uploaded it to Facebook. Not so. Apparently the restaurant posted the image. I couldn’t find it, they must have deleted it.

Then I wondered whether this was a clever PR trick. Upload a photo, get lots of comments and links. That though died when the Facebook timeline reveals that the restaurant tried to justify its attitude on penalty rates… on Facebook.

Social media can be savage; I read some of the Facebook and Twitter responses. Harsh punishment. Not the image the restaurant wants to show.

I’ve often told the story of how I got into copywriting – via press releases. At the time (1980s!) I was running a business which was spending HUGE amounts on display advertising in Sunday newspapers. Since press releases cost us nothing except a few postage stamps, I sent out ten press releases to various media outlets.

Hey presto – we got fantastic coverage: radio, TV, magazines…

Yes, those days were different. However, the underlying marketing is the same now as it was then.

To get publicity, you need:

A hook – a good story – for media attention;

A belief in yourself, and the worth of your business;

A little creativity.

All these years later, the media isn’t what it once was. However, publicity is just as powerful now as it was then. And it’s basically free. All you need is a story that’s attention-getting.

You may be wondering about a press release’s value in these days of Hummingbird.

3. Have a strategy: help your audience to discover you.

Press releases are content. Post your releases into a Media, or Newsroom section of your website. Over time, those releases tell the story of your business.

Many of your site visitors have never heard of you, so several years’ worth of releases on your website increase their trust in your business.

4. Turn on the glamor: add images and video.

Glitz up your press release. Add images from your media kit, as well as images you’ve created for your current content campaign. You can also add a video, and a downloads like a white paper, or a report.

These items increase the likelihood that people finding the release will click through to your website.

5. Yes, use links in your releases (for traffic, rather than SEO)

Finally, of course you can use links in your press releases. You want traffic. If you’ve been hammering several keyword heavily in your online activities, avoid using them. Use other words as anchor text.

Your aim is to get traffic from your press releases, and if you include a newsworthy theme and story, you will.

So there you have it – five press release tricks to help your small business. Now, go and get some publicity – you deserve it!

Need some help? I create press releases for clients. My aim is to find a theme, and tell your story.

How much is free publicity worth to you? Most businesses would kill for a good media story. However, “the media” is no longer what it used to be, and it’s no longer the only game in town. Social media influencers, with thousands of people in their networks, can give you a public relations boost – and with little effort for you.

SmartCompany reports that the 1888 Hotel in Sydney gives anyone with over 10,000 Instagram followers a free night’s stay. Worthwhile for the hotel, because Instagram influencers will post images of their stay. (They’d be churlish if they didn’t.)

If you’re trying to build your social media networks with Likes (Facebook), +1s (Google+) and Mentions (Twitter), you can get in on the “don’t pay me, like me” trend too.

Pay With a Tweet (free)

Pay With a Tweet is one of the most popular social-share payment options. It’s simple to use. Just choose whether you’d like to be paid with a tweet or a Facebook post, upload your goodie or coupon download URL, and get your code.

Cloud:flood (free)

Cloud:flood is similar to Pay With A Tweet. However, in this case, your aim is traffic to a landing page, in addition to the social shares.

Pay With a Like (commercial WordPress plugin, $19)

Simply allow visitors to exchange a Like, +1 or Tweet for post content, videos, a free download, a coupon code or pretty much anything you want.

Then, by clicking Like, they’ll promote your site to their friends, followers and colleagues… who may also want to pay with a like.

Contact influencers directly (yes, bribe them)

Programs like Pay With a Tweet, Cloud:flood and Pay With a Like are great for small businesses, because they’re set-and-forget. There’s another option you can consider: contacting influencers directly, and giving them something for which they’ll pay with social shares, or similar.

This is a little more time-intensive than the automatic options, but depending on your business, can be well worth the effort.

What could you do if you had an unlimited advertising budget? Maybe you’re salivating, thinking of all the advertising you could buy.

Sadly, even with an unlimited advertising budget, your results may not be as amazing as you hope.

Here’s why. When you buy advertising, you’re limited to the advertising venues you choose. In 2013, audiences are fragmented. If you choose to advertise on radio and TV, you won’t reach all the people in your target audience. Your audience may miss your ads completely. That’s money down the drain. The same applies to any advertising venue – you’ll reach just a small part of your potential audience.

Every business needs to advertise. However, for true effectiveness, you need something else: publicity. Publicity amplifies the effect of your advertising, and it’s long-lasting. I’ve often told the story of I first got into copywriting… how a press release I wrote changed the fortunes of my employer.

You need publicity as well as advertising

Few businesses strive for publicity. Public relations tends to be a mystery. Businesses may not even be aware that most news stories in print and digital media originate from a press release.

Here’s a secret: journalists mine their press releases looking for the faintest glimmer of gold amongst the trash. Finding a story is GOLD to them. Providing that gold isn’t easy. However, it’s possible. What could your company achieve if a journalist or three wrote about you? If you appeared in Google News?

You need just two things to create a powerful publicity campaign: time and imagination.

Firstly you create the content for your campaign, and then you launch it.

What do you need to include in a publicity campaign?

A few days ago one of my writing students contacted me about a new ebook she’s launching. She asked me what she would need to include in her first publicity campaign.

Good question. The short answer is, anything you like. It’s your campaign, so whatever you think goes. Ask yourself some questions. How much time do you have available? What results do you want?

Let’s say that you want to create a customized publicity campaign this week to promote something. That “something” could be your business, a new product you’re launching, or a service you provide. As in the case of my student, it could be an ebook. Maybe it’s something for your community – your child’s school needs new sporting equipment, and you’re running a donations drive.

Your first step in any publicity campaign is always to set clearly defined goal.

The next step is to decide what your message will be, and commit to staying on message. “Staying on message” throughout your campaign is perhaps the hardest thing to do, as any politician will tell you. It’s a challenge, but you won’t get the results you want unless you manage to do that.

Let’s get started…

Step 1: set a clearly defined goal

Write down your goal for this publicity campaign. Please don’t omit doing this. You must write down your goal, because you won’t remember what it is tomorrow. Trust me on this one.

Step 2: what’s your campaign’s message? Write it down

Write down the message in a sentence, preferably on a sticky note (stick it onto your phone), as well as in your diary. Make sure the message is in front of you DAILY.

At a minimum, include a company backgrounder, some photographs, and anything else you think would be helpful to a journalist or blogger who wants to write about whatever it is that you’re promoting.

Many companies add their company’s media kit to the “media” section of their website. You can do this too.

However, for the sake of this publicity campaign, create a customized media kit which focuses solely on your goals for this campaign, rather than on your company as a whole.

Let’s get started with your customized publicity campaign

Set a date on which you’ll begin your campaign. Please don’t put it too far in the future. Give yourself a week for preparation. If you give yourself too much time, it won’t get done.

Next, decide what you’ll include in your campaign.

You could include: a series of press releases, Facebook and Google+ pages, a webinar, guest posts on blogs, a blog tour, content marketing with articles… anything you like.

Ask yourself: What am I comfortable creating? Or hiring someone to create for me?

LIMIT yourself. Don’t aim to include too much. A press release, a blog post, a YouTube video, and a couple of articles, might be all that you can comfortably create in a week.

Every company has different resources. Use them. If you have a mailing list, make good use of that list. These are people who want to hear from you, who have done business with you, and who know you. They can help you to get the word out. So include mailings to your list in your list of activities for your publicity campaign.

Create your creative material

Create your material. If you’re a copywriter, you can do it yourself. Alternatively you can hire someone.

The time element: avoid becoming overwhelmed

We’ll have more to say on the various elements of a publicity campaign later – I’ll create some additional how-to material for you on this blog.

For now, consider the time you have available.

If you’re doing everything yourself, creating all the creative material might take you a week or more. Aim to have everything ready before you launch the publicity campaign. Once you launch, you’ll be so busy talking to people and running your business, that you won’t have time to create additional material.

However, don’t set the launch date so far in the future that you procrastinate. As stated, I recommend that you take a maximum of ONE week to create to your campaign material, and then a week to execute. Any longer than that, and your campaign will stall.

Just get it done. :-)

There you have it. You’re good to go. Set a goal for your campaign, decide on a message, and start creating your material today.